The present invention relates to trimmers for trimming vegetation, and more particularly, to hand held trimmers for trimming vegetation such as hedges and the like.
Motorized trimmers for cutting heavy vegetation such as hedges and the like are widely recognized as being a great convenience to persons who trim such vegetation so as to provide the vegetation with an aesthetically pleasing appearance. Typically, these vegetation trimming devices include an engine or power source, which may be powered either electrically or through an internal combustion process, a handle apparatus and a cutting unit. Originally, such vegetation trimming devices included a one-sided reciprocating blade assembly and a drive mechanism or gear box which was in turn driven by the motor.
Presently, there is known in the art vegetation trimmers utilizing a two-sided reciprocating blade means. The two-sided blade means was an improvement to the user of these vegetation trimmers since it permitted the user to trim vegetation while guiding the cutting means in either direction across the surface of the vegetation. In addition, the interval between sharpening of the reciprocating blades can be increased if both sides of the two-sided reciprocating blade means are evenly used.
There are known in the art numerous commercially available vegetation trimmers having two-sided reciprocating cutting blades driven by an electric motor or an internal combustion engine. These vegetation trimmers typically have the cutting blade assembly and the motor positioned in close proximity to each other cantilevered off the forward end of the vegetation trimmer handle. This unbalanced arrangement requires the operator of the vegetation trimmer to support the cantilevered weight of both the motor and reciprocating blade assembly while using the trimmer, thus tiring the trimmer operator more quickly. Trimmers so arranged typically include a secondary handle so as to permit the operator to more comfortably use the trimming devices of the prior art. As such, these devices require the normal operator to hold the trimmer with both hands at all times in order to support this unbalanced configuration.